Dry Point
Fragile Merimaid Size: 13x18cm Medium: Dry Point Date: November 2016 With inspiration from Art Nouveau, this piece was made to showcase the harsh reality of man kind. I wanted to sketch a beautiful looking, broken down mermaid so that I could express my view on how man kind has selfishly destroyed so many beautiful things. |
Artistic Inspiration
My original inspiration for the theme and subject of my piece came from my IB Literature class, when we were studying Pablo Neruda's Poetry. The poem that really stuck out to me and inspired me is called "The Fable of the Mermaid and the Drunks". I was very moved my this poem because I thought it was a beautiful way to get across a theme of destruction of innocence and nature by man. In the poem, it gives a picture of an innocent mermaid walking in to the harshness and rape of drunk men in a bar. I really wanted to turn my feelings and thoughts towards this work into an art piece. It inspired me to create an image of such a beautiful mermaid curled up, and hopeless.
Along with inspiration from the poem, I gathered inspiration for the look of my piece as well. I picked to create my piece by incorporating visual concepts and ideas from Art Nouveau. Art Nouveau was an art movement mainly based around decorative art and architecture in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It was made to modernize design and was created with a combination of organic and geometric forms. Art Nouveau is also well known for its beautiful posters, graphic work, and illustration. One Art Nouveau painter and decorative artist was Alphonse Mucha. Mucha produced postcards, advertisements, and illustrations. Much of Mochas work was created to celebrate feminity in a world powers by men. He informed the idea that anything could be art by extending his pieces beyond traditional art and into everyday life.
I was inspired my Mucha because his images are mostly of beautiful women. The poem, "The Fable of the Mermaids and the Drunks" is about a beautiful creature getting destroyed, and so Mucha inspired me to represent my feelings on the poem this way. Mucha is often seen with works that contain circles in the back to emphasize the women portrayed, and so I was inspired to do this in my work as well.
Planning
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Originally, when I started thinking of different topics and themes for my dry point, I gathered inspiration from the poem The Fable of the Mermaid and the Drunks from my IB literature class. This gave me the idea to create a piece with a mermaid as the main subject. Not only was a mermaid the main character in the poem, but I thought that a mermaid was a good symbol for the message I was trying to get across because a mermaid can be both a woman and a beautiful animal. The overarching theme that I picked was destruction by man kind, but the poem communicates this theme through both the rape of women and through the destruction of nature.
The sketches on the top are very basic idea planning sketches and the sketch on the bottom is a more detailed version that I used for my actual dry point piece. When deciding on the pose of the mermaid, I chose to position her in the fetal position to symbolize innocence. This symbolizes innocence because babies in the womb take on this pose and babies are, in a way, the most innocent humans. I chose to imitate certain aspects of Mucha's Art Nouveau artwork because many of his works celebrated femininity by displaying beautiful pictures of women. I really wanted to create a beautiful yet sad image so that my theme came across clear. |
Process & Experimentation
After drawing out a plan of what I wanted my finished piece to look like, I placed the plastic sheet over the top and used my sketch to outline the mermaid by carving into the plastic with a sharp carving tool. At first, when carving into the plastic, my lines were very rough (especially on the tail area) because I was trying to get them to be deep so that I could treat more contrast when I printed it, so I tried to smooth these out by making the line thicker.
To avoid more "sketchy" lines, I carved the lines in the hair with one stroke instead of going over it multiple times. This helped to make the lines smoother but it also made them less deep, which turned the hair lighter when printing. I tried to make the mermaids hair like hair of paintings from Art Nouveau by shading very little and by having it go freely everywhere around the mermaids head. |
It was hard to take a picture of this (because it was see-through), but to the left is a picture of my finished piece. I carved a circle and some shapes and designs into the back of the mermaid so that it was more like Art Nouveau. One of the shapes I drew are like tears to help symbolize the emotions felt in my inspiration, The Fable of the Mermaid and the Drunks.
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I used pieces of ripped-up newsprint to wipe off the ink. I tried to get all of the ink in between lines I carved so that the lines didn't blend together after they were printed. Once I thought all of the ink was off that wasn't in the cracks, I placed it onto of a piece of paper soaked in water. I then used a machine to press the ink into the paper by using pressure. |
Reflection
Overall, I like how my piece turned out. If I could change anything, I would have carved some of the lines a little differently so that my print could come out more even. Even though some areas of my dry point turned out to be darker and lighter than others, the overall image seemed to print pretty well the second time that I printed it.
I took a lot of inspiration from my artistic inspiration and I think that you can clearly see the effects that it had on my piece, both in the style, shapes used, and in the theme. I will definitely be using other types of art (like poems) as my theme inspiration more often because this project made me realize that I like to create visual representations of written work.
Overall, I really like the process of carving into something and then using ink to print, and this project helped me learn about how to balance contrast within a piece.
I took a lot of inspiration from my artistic inspiration and I think that you can clearly see the effects that it had on my piece, both in the style, shapes used, and in the theme. I will definitely be using other types of art (like poems) as my theme inspiration more often because this project made me realize that I like to create visual representations of written work.
Overall, I really like the process of carving into something and then using ink to print, and this project helped me learn about how to balance contrast within a piece.
Connecting Dry Point to the ACT
1) Identify cause and effect relationships between your inspiration and your artwork.
My inspiration caused me to represent the theme of my project the way I did (with a mermaid). I also caused me to create the design that I did in the background with the circle and shapes.
2)What is the overall approach the author has regarding the topic of your inspiration?
The author of the poem in which I based my theme on has an attitude of disgust towards the subject of his work.
3)What kind of generalizations and conclusions have you discovered about people, ideas, cultures, etc. while you researched your inspiration?
In general, because some of Art Nouveau was based on expressing the beauty of feminism, I made the generalization that femininity was put down under masculinity in that time.
4)What was the central idea or theme around your inspirational research?
The central theme of The Fable of the Mermaid and the Drunks is destruction of nature and of beautiful things by man. The theme of Mocha and Art Nouveau is the appreciation of femininity. I combined both of these themes together to create my piece.
5)What kind of inferences did you make while reading your research?
I made inferences about the actual subject of the poem, The Fable of the Mermaid and the Drunks.
My inspiration caused me to represent the theme of my project the way I did (with a mermaid). I also caused me to create the design that I did in the background with the circle and shapes.
2)What is the overall approach the author has regarding the topic of your inspiration?
The author of the poem in which I based my theme on has an attitude of disgust towards the subject of his work.
3)What kind of generalizations and conclusions have you discovered about people, ideas, cultures, etc. while you researched your inspiration?
In general, because some of Art Nouveau was based on expressing the beauty of feminism, I made the generalization that femininity was put down under masculinity in that time.
4)What was the central idea or theme around your inspirational research?
The central theme of The Fable of the Mermaid and the Drunks is destruction of nature and of beautiful things by man. The theme of Mocha and Art Nouveau is the appreciation of femininity. I combined both of these themes together to create my piece.
5)What kind of inferences did you make while reading your research?
I made inferences about the actual subject of the poem, The Fable of the Mermaid and the Drunks.
Sources
"Alphonse Mucha Biography, Art, and Analysis of Works." The Art Story. N.p., n.d. Web. 02 Nov. 2016. <http://www.theartstory.org/artist-mucha-alphonse.htm>.